West Aurora High student's golden ticket will take him on trip to Uganda

It was like a scene taken right out of the 1971 movie "Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory".

West Aurora High School junior Jose Ramos bought an Invisible Children DVD after a presentation about the San Diego-based organization with a mission to better the lives of forgotten children in northern Uganda. Just like the children in "Willy Wonka" who found golden tickets prizes in their chocolate candy bars, Ramos found a golden ticket in his DVD.

Instead of winning a trip to the super secret chocolate factory, Ramos is one of three golden ticket winners of a two-week trip to Uganda in July 2009 with the Invisible Children organization.

"I didn't know anything about the prize. My mom asked me to buy the DVD," Ramos said. "They videotaped everyone opening their DVDs and I was really surprised."

Ramos attended the school's Invisible Children Global Night out last May. He raised money for the group by playing dodgeball all night at the event.

But he didn't actually join the club until he got the golden ticket.

The student president of West High's 120-member Invisible Children Club was at first disappointed to hear that her classmate got the Golden Ticket.

Junior Alexandra Elgindy, a passionate devotee of the Invisible Children cause, had been sure that she would be the one to get the ticket to Uganda.

"Everybody kept telling me that I was going to win the ticket to Uganda. Then all of a sudden I saw cameras around Jose and I was fuming," she remembered.

"But I am not disappointed any more," she said. "Once I got to know Jose I was so excited to see him going. Now I really want to win a trip so I can go with Jose."

Ramos has made a big effort to help his new friend Alex win a trip for herself. She is trying to collect over 22,000 books by the New Year to send overseas to win another all-expense trip.

Invisible Children is offering its followers four ways to win a trip to Uganda.

Ramos is one of three to win with a golden ticket. Others will win tickets by raising the most money, coming up with the best new fundraising idea and donating the most books for school libraries in Uganda.

Ramos collected 100 books from his house and his aunts helped with 500 more.

"My one aunt works in a nursing home and one man donated his book collection," Ramos said. "I have another 200 books at my house now and I am getting more."

"We're not afraid of high goals," said club sponsor Christina Tammen. She says the group has about 2,500 books in the school basement as of the first week of December.

"We know that books matter. There are about 26,000 books in our library at West High," Tammen said. "They have one book for 120 kids in Uganda. We want to help those children and one book that will open up their world."

Ramos said that the Invisible Children videos do a good job of explaining and promoting their mission.

"I used to think that I had it hard, but now I know there's no comparison between my life and theirs," Ramos said.

The Invisible Children Club has found more friends to help the cause.

The friends of TriCity Family Services donated all the leftover books from their book sale fundraiser to the cause.

"We are so happy to get more use out of books that have been donated to us," said Diane Gibson who is heading the fundraiser for TCFS.

The Invisible Children Club is taking book donations at Door 1 at West Aurora High School 1201 W. New York St. in Aurora. Books must have an ISBN number which is a bar code usually found on a hardback books back cover and the inside cover of a paperback book. The club is also taking DVDs, music CDs but they must be operable and include the original artwork and casing. The club cannot accept moldy, damaged books, magazines, or law books.

Contact Tammen at West Aurora High School for more information about how you can donate books. Her phone numbers are (630) 452-3055 or (630) 301-6613 or email her at ctammen@sd129.org.

Check out the Invisible Children Web site www.invisiblechildren.com for details about all the schools for schools fundraisers being held in the United States for the schools in northern Uganda.